Israel vs Palestine/Lebanon/Iran/Yemen/Syria: a New Middle East War

[Tintin]

Posted by shaberon (here)

....according to Arab tradition, the eldest son of Noah, Shem, founded the city of Sana’a...

and this is a Yemeni Sabian text:



Israelite legend about Shem was grafted to them, whereas the other two terms are more plausibly of self-origin.

Personally, I'm highly doubtful that "semite" has anything whatsoever to do with "Shem", at all. In fact I'd say not at all. My sense is that this is most definitely a fabrication: we are supposed to think that. For my money I'm inclined toward that as a later scripted fiction to add some legitimacy to an ethno-centric supremacy of sorts. Not buying that I'm afraid.

And who exactly was Noah anyway? Where did the name originate, and what does it mean? What of Ham and Japeth? Questions: questions.

And how much can we really trust, at all, the Old Testament: how much of that is the product of wild imagination, propaganda, etc.? Chosen people? Chosen to do what exactly? What's with all the "racism"? How legitimate is it really as a historical resource? Where's all the missing stuff?

Perhaps I'm being mischievous: I do have some answers but you see where I'm going with this of course

[Rizotto]

https://sputnikglobe.com/20241020/ir...120608865.html

October 20, 2024

Iran’s Foreign Minister: Targets in Israel Are Set, Retaliation Ready if Attacked

The Iranian command has identified targets in Israel that will be struck if Israeli forces attack Iran, stated Iranian Foreign Minister Seyed Abbas Araghchi.

"Any attack against Iran means crossing its red line. We will not leave it unanswered. A necessary response will be given to any attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities or a similar raid," he said, as quoted by PressTV, adding that Tehran has "now identified all our targets (...), and a similar attack will be carried out on them."
He also criticized the US, stating that without its support, Israel would not be able to conduct military operations in Gaza and Lebanon. "If the Americans truly had the political will, they could stop Israel and end the attacks," the minister added.
"If a large-scale war breaks out in the region, the United States will be drawn into it, something we do not want at all," Araghchi noted, pointing out that the conflict could spread to Gulf countries, though there is still a chance for diplomatic resolution.
Meanwhile, an official from an Israeli minister's office told The Times of Israel that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will convene a security cabinet meeting at the Kirya government complex in Tel Aviv. The newspaper notes that the meeting comes as Israel continues preparations for a potential strike on Iran.
On October 1, as part of the True Promise 2 operation, Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps launched a large number of rockets at Israel. The Israeli military stated that they would respond to the attack when they deem it necessary.

[shaberon]

Posted by Tintin (here)
Personally, I'm highly doubtful that "semite" has anything whatsoever to do with "Shem", at all. In fact I'd say not at all. My sense is that this is most definitely a fabrication: we are supposed to think that. For my money I'm inclined toward that as a later scripted fiction to add some legitimacy to an ethno-centric supremacy of sorts. Not buying that I'm afraid.

And who exactly was Noah anyway? Where did the name originate, and what does it mean? What of Ham and Japeth? Questions: questions.

Yes, exactly. I do not doubt that the natives came up with "Arab" -- perhaps at 1,000 B. C. E. or even before -- however Genesis in its current form comes out of the Captivity, probably taking some actual people and events, dramatizing them, and flipping them around to occur before the more legitimate history as found in the Book of Kings. And, unfortunately, this lineage stuff is taken extremely seriously by way too many people, otherwise I would ignore it altogether.

Moreover, this same technique is exported to India, and goes through the same process -- garbled later events switched to appear before the actual records. This type of Babylonian insertion does not appear there until around 200 B. C. E., so, it appears it was probably "learned" from the west. It is a near-identical copy of Noah. Such an event cannot be found to have happened by any objective analysis, which instead would render it silly. Zoroastrianism is the same -- the Gathas don't have it, and it appears in later additions.

Back then, they didn't know that, and it is perhaps understandable that if you were visited by a "wise person", you might accept whatever they said. You'd have no way to argue against this. If you weren't told, you wouldn't know. Many strands of uncontaminated folklore have nothing resembling such a patriarch and specialized descent; it doesn't seem normal for people to concentrate on this.

We found that Prophet Muhammad PBUH was opposed to anyone trying to "family tree" him, and so the Islamic version of Genesis is of less value than the Hadiths.

In each case, if you look at the primitive original versions -- Gathas, Riks, Hadiths, Psalms, Sayings Gospels -- they are of an almost entirely different nature than the later accumulations.



Returning to the present, I've noticed one Gulf State not being particularly resistant -- Kuwait. I don't know if it qualifies as an "ancient civilization"; in our first Gulf War, it was told to me that the place is a pyramid scheme, an exclusive bedroom community, similar to Monaco, and so we were insane to be "defending" it. Now it will pop up quickly as we see the likely formation of Hezbollah of everyone:

"Today, the Minister of Foreign Affairs will visit two important countries in the region, namely Kuwait and Bahrain," said Baghaei.

“We know that the countries of the region, in interaction with their partners, are trying to organize public mobilization against the killing” of innocent people by the occupying regime, he said.

He continued to talk about the alleged leaked documents about the bank of targets of Israeli regime airstrikes, warning that "We do not want to comment about whether this alleged leaked document was fake or correct. However, we would like to say that We are fully prepared to respond to any aggression."

So, yes, of course everyone is aware of the possibly misleading nature of "leaked documents". And it is for the best that they do not disclose their way of thinking on this.


Just to be doubly depressing -- because a lot of German translators have usually been more fair than the British -- it turns out their modern apparatus is little other than NED of Germany:

According to information obtained by Tehran Times, earlier this month, two branches of the German Language Institute (DSIT) were closed following orders from the Iranian judiciary. The Tehran Times has gathered information suggesting that the language school functioned as a covert operation for the German government to influence Iranian citizens and advance Germany's political agenda in Iran.

The money came from the Goethe-Institut, an organization officially financed by the German government that has over a hundred branches globally. While it presents itself as an independent entity dedicated to promoting the German language and culture, numerous reports indicate that the Goethe-Institut frequently functions as a political arm of the German government.

Germany, still grappling with its imperialist ambitions, struggles to accept that a dignified nation has shut down its software center and infiltration hub. This is why it views the closure of DSIT as a retaliatory action in response to the shutdown of the Islamic Center Hamburg (IZH), a source familiar with the situation told the Tehran Times.

Last month, German police conducted an unannounced and unwarranted raid on 53 properties across the country linked to the Islamic Center Hamburg, Germany’s oldest and leading Shia Muslim center. The move is believed to have been made under pressure from the Israeli lobby in the European country.

“What the German embassy fails to take into account is that at least in Iran, citizens have the freedom to express dissent when they disagree with government actions. That’s while in Germany, individuals face immediate repercussions for speaking out against the government's backing of the Israeli regime, which is committing genocide in Gaza,” the source said.

That's a very disappointing result of supposedly pan-humanistic melding. Germany has been trying to "empire" the middle east, while Britain has tried to clamp down Germany since it was born. That is why the adventure of St. Germain to Isfahan is more interesting. That would also reveal early galvanization against what was then called "Money Power". And why this individual is so heavily caluminated and obscured. For the first time, you had got some ideas from outside the "narrow" discourse, and the basis of the political struggle we still experience.

[Michel Leclerc]

Posted by Tintin (here)

Posted by shaberon (here)

....according to Arab tradition, the eldest son of Noah, Shem, founded the city of Sana’a...

and this is a Yemeni Sabian text:



Israelite legend about Shem was grafted to them, whereas the other two terms are more plausibly of self-origin.

Personally, I'm highly doubtful that "semite" has anything whatsoever to do with "Shem", at all. In fact I'd say not at all. My sense is that this is most definitely a fabrication: we are supposed to think that. For my money I'm inclined toward that as a later scripted fiction to add some legitimacy to an ethno-centric supremacy of sorts. Not buying that I'm afraid.

And who exactly was Noah anyway? Where did the name originate, and what does it mean? What of Ham and Japeth? Questions: questions.

And how much can we really trust, at all, the Old Testament: how much of that is the product of wild imagination, propaganda, etc.? Chosen people? Chosen to do what exactly? What's with all the "racism"? How legitimate is it really as a historical resource? Where's all the missing stuff?

Perhaps I'm being mischievous: I do have some answers but you see where I'm going with this of course

Thank you Tintin.

Whatever mythological explanations one may give to the name of "Sem”, it is a fact that:

(1) a vast number of languages (hundreds!), among which quite famous modern ones like Arabic, modern “Hebrew” (Ivrit), Aramaean, Amharic, and extinct ones like Akkadian/Assyrian/Babylonian, Ugaritic, Phoenician and Punic (Punic being the language of Carthago, a colony of Phoenicia), Canaanite, Biblical Hebrew, Sabaean, are all closely related,

(2) the linguistic consensus is to call these languages Semitic languages,

(3) the Semitic languages are closely related to another language macro family, called the Hamitic one (best known languages: Pharaonic Egyptian and Berber); the pair is called Hamito-Semitic or Afroasiatic;

(4) Hamito-Semitic or Afroasiatic is in itself related to the other language macrofamilies belonging to the “Nostratic” "mega family" (the degree of proximity being under discussion): to Nostratic belong as well the Indo-European, the Uralic (Finnish, Estonian, Hungarian, Sami), the Altaic (all Turkic languages, Mongolian, Korean, Japanese), the (South Indian) Dravidian (Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam) and the Kartvelian (Georgian and other languages of the Caucasus) languages.

In other words: the Semitic languages are Semitic languages. One can dispute calling them that way, but that is going to be a long uphill battle. May I remind the honourable PA members that the word “Semitic” has its equivalent in all the languages of the world, and hence, logically, also in the languages called Semitic?

In Yemen, where Arabic is spoken, their own language, Arabic, will be called a Semitic language (lughatun sāmiyatun: لُغَتٌ سَامِيَةٌ.
Speakers of a Semitic language are then called Semites; a Semite is in Arabic a sāmiy: سَامِي.

These are facts. An anti-Semite is somebody who is a (phobic?) adversary of people who speak Semitic languages and/or identify as Semites.

Sorry for insisting on the language part of the equation. However one cannot “unfact” facts.
Those facts are so compelling that (listen carefully) the Zionist Antisemites wanted a Semitic language of their own (instead of just plainly learning Arabic for instance when they immigrated in Palestine), so they concocted a modern version of Biblical Hebrew. (There are no traces of the word “telephone” in Biblical Hebrew, mind you.) It does work, I have to admit, for the aficionados.

I am definitely not an anti-Semite, as you can tell. And considering my love for Arabic, its poets and its philosophers, I would pride myself on being called a philo-Semite. That qualifier certainly covers equally my admiration for the Zohar, one of the world’s great works of spiritual literature.

[Kryztian]

For those of you who think the only thing that matters is October 7th.

[Ravenlocke]

Text:
BREAKING:

🇮🇱🇱🇧 Israel announced it will start bombing HOSPITALS in Beirut

Israeli army spokesman:

"Hezbollah built a tunnel under a hospital in Haret Hreik in the southern suburbs of Beirut

The Israeli army will begin, within the coming hours, a wave of attacks on targets in the suburb of Beirut."


https://x.com/Megatron_ron/status/1848425382858391884

[Ravenlocke]

https://x.com/IranObserver0/status/1848409742177407418

Text:
JUST IN:

🇮🇱 | Channel 12:

"Hezbollah has hacked the communication system at the port of Haifa and warned workers to evacuate"

'Hundreds of workers at the Haifa port received a message that read: ’We know you are one of the workers at the port; it will be one of the targets of our missiles’'

https://x.com/Megatron_ron/status/1848405855059980721

[Ravenlocke]

https://x.com/georgegalloway/status/1848289422095093922

Text:
— How are you?
Girl: May Allah keep you safe and well!

— Why are you carrying your brother (sister) like that?
Girl: She was trampled in…

— And where are you taking her now?
Girl: We’re going to our tent.

— And you’re not tired carrying her like that? Are you tired or not?
Girl I’m tired. I’ve been carrying her for an hour and we can’t…

— And where are you going right now?
Girl: I’m going to the hospital!

https://x.com/gazanotice/status/1848298289868734548

[Ravenlocke]

https://x.com/gazanotice/status/1848319941885239326

[Ravenlocke]

https://x.com/gazanotice/status/1848338293273805135

[Ravenlocke]

https://x.com/gazanotice/status/1848345756609958054

https://x.com/gazanotice/status/1848461705250066590

https://x.com/gazanotice/status/1848455583172604369

[Ravenlocke]

https://x.com/gazanotice/status/1848481672888508720

[Ravenlocke]

https://x.com/Palestinecapti1/status...04175743115737

[Ravenlocke]

https://x.com/TheCradleMedia/status/1848325020457546004

https://thecradle.co/articles-id/27360

'Everyone not dead or injured is mentally damaged': Israeli army hit by silent crisis
A growing number of Israeli soldiers are quietly refusing orders to return to battle in Gaza

After a year of committing genocide in Gaza, more and more Israeli soldiers are quietly refusing orders to return to the strip to fight, saying they are depressed, worn out, psychologically damaged, and unmotivated, according to a report by Ha-Makom magazine published on 20 October.

The ultra-Orthodox-oriented magazine interviewed multiple soldiers and parents of soldiers who refuse to return to Gaza. When a platoon of 30 soldiers of the Nahal Brigade was recently ordered to enter Gaza for the latest of several tours, only six reported for duty.

“I call it refusal and rebellion,” says Inbal, the mother of one of the soldiers in the platoon.

“They return to the same buildings that they cleaned, each time trapping them anew. They have been to Al-Zaytoun neighborhood three times already. They understand that it is futile and pointless.”

Although they had only a fifth of their personnel, the commander still insisted they enter Gaza.

“Because they were a small team, they couldn't go out on missions. They just stayed there and waited for the time to pass. It was even more unnecessary.”

In addition to battling Hamas fighters, Israeli soldiers have been demolishing residential buildings with explosives, sniping children, shelling hospitals and schools housing displaced people, and destroying Gaza's water and electrical infrastructure.

One parent of a soldier in Nahal said that according to her son, “The wards are empty. Everyone who is not dead or injured is mentally damaged. There are very few left who returned to fight. And they're not quite right either.”

After Israel's ground invasion of Lebanon, in which many soldiers have already been killed and injured, her son told her, “I don't know what army they're thinking of entering Lebanon with, but I'm not going back to the battalion.”

According to those interviewed by Ha-Makom, there is no movement among the soldiers to refuse to serve.

Instead, one goes quietly to his commander and says he is unable to fight. He is then removed and placed in a non-combat position elsewhere.

“Things are resolved within the unit. It happens all the time. There is an incessant covert drop from fighting,” one parent explained.

Among mothers, the phenomenon is called “silent refusal” or “gray refusal.”

Soldiers feel demoralized having to return to places in Gaza where they fought months ago and supposedly defeated Hamas.

“When the return to the places we were in, such as Jabalia, Al-Zaytoun, and Shujaiya, began, it broke the soldiers,” a parent named Eidit explains.

“These are the same places where they lost their friends. The area was already clean. It had to be preserved. It frustrated them a lot. What kills them is the conditions and the duration of the fighting, which has no end in sight. You never know when you will get out, and it's been like this for a year. Not to mention the loss and the difficult sights they see in Gaza.”

Yael, the mother of a fighter in a commando brigade, said that her son told her, “We are like sitting ducks at the range. We don't understand what we're doing here. The abductees don't come back a second and third time, and you see it's endless, and soldiers get injured and die on the way.”

In March, four fighters of the unit were killed, and dozens more were injured in three different attacks.

After returning from Gaza, the soldier's unit was converted to a reserve unit and sent right back to fight in the enclave.

“He told his commander that he wanted to remain a fighter in the reserves but that, at the moment, he is unable to because of his parents … He was released but did not receive an order 8,” which is an order to be called up to fight in the reserves.

The commanders shame the soldiers who say they can no longer fight. The commanders say they are abandoning their fellow soldiers and try to convince them to fight, but ultimately take no action against the soldiers.

“Two months before him, two fighters from his team refused and that is what gave him the courage. At the moment, most of them have not been put in prison, and the phenomenon is just kept quiet.”

Ha-Makom added, “After 12 consecutive months of a war that goes nowhere, the soldiers are ‘black.’ In military slang, this means that they are depressed, worn out and unmotivated.”

[Ravenlocke]

Text:
American journalist
@loffredojeremy
is on his way home after being informally deported by the Israeli police. Following an arbitrary arrest by the Israeli military at a West Bank checkpoint, Jeremy was blindfolded, shackled in a military truck, then held in solitary confinement for three days with little food or water. Israeli authorities had falsely accused him of "supporting an enemy during wartime" for legitimate reporting he performed for The Grayzone.

Though two Israeli judges ruled Jeremy's reporting did not violate the military censor's policy, they gave the police until October 20 to investigate him. During that period, the police seized and hacked into his phone, confiscated his wallet and passport, and interrogated him repeatedly at a station in occupied territory.

When the deadline to wrap the investigation arrived, the police quit their fishing expedition and ordered Jeremy to book the first available flight out of the country. He was interrogated one final time at Ben Gurion International Airport, then allowed to leave.

Jeremy's persecution for publishing factual journalism reflects the paranoid attitude of an Israeli state that is ruthlessly repressing critical reporting in the occupied West Bank and besieged Gaza Strip, where it has killed more than 120 Palestinian journalists in just over a year, making it the deadliest conflict for media professionals in the 21st century.

We're extremely grateful for the massive outpouring of support Jeremy received. The pressure generated by our colleagues, supporters and press freedom orgs played a pivotal role in ending his wrongful detention. Jeremy will provide a detailed account of the whole disturbing saga as soon as he returns to the US.

https://x.com/MaxBlumenthal/status/1848475749214564454

[shaberon]

Here's a couple of quick things on the issue of pre-Solomonic Canaan. Being unfamiliar with things like "Bronze Age Collapse", or "Greek Dark Age", instead of wriggling with the details, here again we can find some categorical "markers". What comes screaming off the page is that what "collapsed" was the Mycenean Palace Economy which was an Oligarchy:

Geopolitical powers of the time relied on variations of the palace economy system, in which wealth is first concentrated in a centralized bureaucracy before being redistributed according to the sovereign's agenda, a system which primarily benefits the society's elite. This intricate web of dependencies, coupled with the inflexibility of the palace system, exposed these civilizations to the cascading effects of distant disturbances.

This was mixed with unsustainable agriculture -- primarily raising foreign grasses by irrigation. The Mycenean system was copied by the other regional powers -- it's completely "top down". The royals or priests told you what to do, and that's it. So there was this threadbare eggshell in an intricate web of inter-dependencies.

It is suggested the "pre-collapse" era may have been remembered by Hesiod as the Golden Age. However, we must note that prior literature has already revealed the struggle against Oligarchy. That's not new. What is unusual is the persistence of it, because people would overthrow it. It appears the Myceneans mainstreamed it. Perhaps only temporarily, nevertheless, a few centuries in multiple countries is notable.


Let's look at the status quo and ask ourselves, how would a Canaanite "leave Egypt"?






That's right, the Egyptian kingdom would weaken and melt down into the Sinai.

Ok. What about a post-collapse sign of prosperity?

Here's one we will split like a wishbone.

A shipwreck off the coast of Haifa contained tin ingots from 1,000 B. C. E. or slightly before.

What is the "middle eastern Bronze Age"?

A dependency.


The nearest sources of Tin are Cornwall or Afghanistan.

Main problem is there is no metallurgical analysis. Most samples can be sourced to a region, and, in some cases, to a specific mine. Israel owns this stuff and so we can only look at it.


I'll link a small slideshow of it.

The ingots are very clearly inscribed.

In favor of "Cornwall", some have speculated it is Minoan script. However, when you do this and post it online, then, the Cornwall source miraculously changes from "probably" to "the fact" in the next sentence, and does so for the rest of the review. One can look at it, and decide if it is "probably Minoan", of which there are no examples to compare it to.


In favor of "Afghanistan" is that it is IVC script and the theory of a Tin Road from Hanoi to Haifa. This would be exceptional because the script fell out of use centuries earlier.


Would the ability to ship from Cornwall through the Minoans be adequate to explain "the Bronze Age"?

On the other hand, the Tin Road definitely existed prior to 2,000 B. C. E., and, it is only a question of how massive it was. It was most likely commandeered by IVC Shortugai at the headwaters of the Oxus, which equates to a maritime connection to the Caspian Sea, yet also very near the Pamir Highway. In actuality this was probably the geo-political power center; gold was also sourced around there. This site, of course, makes it extremely easy for India to meet the Sintashtans of Russia, who sound like the largest tin customer conceivable.

India did not suffer the "collapse", and, out of all the other symptoms of loss and ruin, the supply of tin and therefor the production of bronze is the only thing that did *not* fade in the middle east. I don't think the "Bronze Age" collapsed. It seems the "Mycenean Palace System" did.

Would that be a reason for Solomon to be a "wiser leader"?

Whose tin is that?

[Helvetic]

MintPress News | "This is not a war" - The Conduct of IDF Operations with former Green Beret Alan Shebaro | Oct. 21, 2024

Source: MintPress News youtube

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=c-2pGDSF7pE

Description:

Tonight on State of Play, we discuss how ongoing Israeli military operations in Gaza, the West Bank, and Southern Lebanon do not constitute the waging of war with former Special Forces operator and Green Beret Alan Shebaro, who has recently returned from the occupied West Bank.

The tactics employed by the IDF are not meant to defeat resistance forces since the resistance will never cease to exist. This “war” has been, from the start, an opportunity to seize land, displace people, and destroy infrastructure, all under the political cover of the United States and its Western allies.

The failure to implement moral consistency when it comes to foreign policy and the blithe disregard for the rules-based order will have long-term ramifications for the United States and Israel.

The world is a less safe place after a year of unmitigated violence. All those who apologize for the genocide and use the conduct of U.S. and coalition forces during the “Global War on Terror” to justify the actions of the IDF are now being intellectually dishonest. This is not a war.

Join us tonight for a conversation between two U.S. Special Operations veterans about the conduct of Israeli forces, their failure to achieve tactical and operational objectives, and what this headless violence means for the conduct of modern warfare going forward.

[Rizotto]

'Whoever it was in the US state department that leaked these documents was trying to prevent WW3'.

Scott Ritter : Secret Documents; Attempts to Assassinate Netanyahu

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=uCt1oRjdufU

[Rizotto]

At 7:23 in the video below there's a CNN interview of House Speaker Mike Johnson about the leaked documents. Johnson said he "called his friend Bibi to encourage him", and that US must stand with its ally Israel. "We" can't appease Iran. Now is the time for maximum pressure against Iran, the head of the snake. Iran is the threat, not Hamas or Hezbollah. (paraphrasing) Etc.

"We will DESTROY Israel's Nuclear sites" Iran warns Netanyahu | Redacted News

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=WUoImkIHMZ4

[shaberon]

Posted by Helvetic (here)
The tactics employed by the IDF are not meant to defeat resistance forces since the resistance will never cease to exist. This “war” has been, from the start, an opportunity to seize land, displace people, and destroy infrastructure, all under the political cover of the United States and its Western allies.

Yes, if "under the political cover" means "with the ammunition of", the rest of it being superfluous fluff, window dressing, like "war on drugs" can't possibly mean anything. Cover indeed. It's not covered very well, we are still riding on the "veto power" of UN Sec.-Counc., among other things only slightly less absolutist.

Terrible to the neighbors, but not so much as the mosquito on an elephant:

Israel too little to be able to pose threat to Iran

The criminal Zionist regime may carry out a desperate, limited, and small attack against Iran to say it has responded, but it certainly cannot carry out an attack that is proportionate to the Operation True-Promise II, Major General Jafari added.

Regarding Iran's response to a possible Israeli attack, he stated, “Iran's response depends on the severity of the enemy's attack. If it does something major and considerable, it will definitely be responded severely and this issue has been announced clearly by the military officials of the country.”

“But I assure people with certainty that the criminal Zionist regime will not make any major or significant moves. Anyway, whatever they do is nothing more than a desperate effort,” he underlined.

Here is a determined effort, caught in a roundabout:

Arab sources reported a missile attack on the US base in Syria's Koniko gas field in northeastern Syria's Deir ez-Zur province.

6 missiles were fired toward the illegal US base, the reports say.

Al Mayadeen reported that at least 4 missiles hit inside the base hosting the US forces.

Eyewitnesses reported that several explosions were heard from inside the US base following the missile attack.

Reports suggest that during this attack, the radar equipment inside the base was destroyed.

There were no immediate reports of possible casualties.

In response to a missile attack on its base in eastern Syria, the US bombed seven villages east of the Euphrates in the suburbs of Deir ez-Zur.

I have one more thing to throw in the fire, for anyone who thinks the recent history before Solomon would have been relevant to him. We found a bigger Oligarchy than I, at least, have noticed elsewhere, which was at the very least "fragile to collapse", which could perhaps very accurately be termed the Mycenean Age. If people knew about this system, then, yes, that could be a motive to erase the memories of it.

Did the eruption on Santorini or Thera affect things significantly, yes, it did. It removed the Minoan influence, because the Myceneans effectively replaced them with their system. Are there any records of existence shortly after the eruption, yes, one can find it mentioned under:


Amenhotep III, r. 1391–1353 or 1388–1351 BC


This is a kettle of fish, because, there are a lot of books from various fields of study that are still unable to pinpoint the eruption itself.

Nothing in art or writing remotely suggests the event that I am aware of.


Here are a few notes culled from a synopsis of synopses:

The topographic list of Amenhotep III of Kom el-Khetan contains a number of place names in the Aegean region. At the top of the list of Aegean place names are the words kftjw tjn3y3 ("keftiu, Danaitsy"). The toponyms mu-k - '(a, i) -na (" Mycenae ") and ku-ti-r (a, i) (" Kythera ") belong to Mycenaean Greece. From Cretan place names, researchers read 'am (a, i) -ni- š (a, u) as" Amnis "(mentioned in the texts of linear B), and kun-ju-š (a, u) as" Knossos ". Perhaps the names of Festus, Kydonia, Thebes, Messene, Nafplion, Lyctus are also transmitted.
Student tablet BM 5647 contains a list of keftiu names.



He [MacGillivray J. A.] suggests that the Cretans, who are first depicted in Egypt during the reign of Hatshepsut, may have been refugees who survived the eruption of Santorini.
The Egyptians rebuilt the Minoan fleet, and in exchange the Minoans supplied them with goods captured in the tombs of the era of Hatshepsut and Thutmose III.


The heyday of Minoan-Egyptian relations came at the beginning of the rule of the XVIII dynasty in Egypt. The Minoan frescoes in two palaces in Tell el-Daba date back to the Tutmoses era. The seven Theban tombs of this period depict Minoan delegations with gifts.


In these two articles, the author analyzes the change in funeral rites in Crete, caused by political changes traditionally associated with the appearance of the Mycenaean Greeks on the island. She [Preston L.] traces the emergence of new types of burials at Knossos and their gradual spread across the island. These data confirm the exceptional importance of Knossos as the political center of all of Crete. The period of centralized power of the bearers of the new burial culture, concentrated in the Knossos palace, is designated as the final palace period: it lasted from the beginning of the 15th to the beginning of the 14th century. BC NS. (Late Minoan II - Late Mino IIIA).
Opulent tombs were built by the new elite, inspired by the earlier burials known in mainland Greece.

The origin of the first settlers may be evidenced by the use of hexaploid wheat, which is not attested in Greece, but which are found in Catal Höyuk.

The "Minoans" themselves were not "Greek", And it is not that hard to see an abrupt change in burial customs.



They are dominant for about three hundred years, and then for post-Mycenean Greece:

The new culture that rose in Greece had a critical, revolutionary difference from all the previous ones; it was secular, based on rational thinking, and left the divine element and the priesthood out of it. The epics were not sung in the royal courts anymore but in festivals with open access to all. Scientific ideas were discussed in the agoras and shared with everybody interested in them, making them a basic good. Progress grew at an exponential rate…

However, there were some remnants left of the Minoan culture. The religious games and the Eleusinian mysteries survived in the Greek religious rituals and the robust law systems of the Cretan city-states and Sparta are thought to be relics of the Minoan one (Unfortunately, the undeciphered Minoan writing doesn’t allow the scholars of our days to delve more in the possible similarities and differences between the two cultures).

So, that is the point of saying the Minoans were probably Anatolian and that the real mysteries were Apollo of Luwa, and there must have been a split between an esoteric underground and an official priesthood.


That's just from quickly reviewing the reviews, and, what I am going to add is far too obvious for them.


The achievement by the Minoan culture in its apex when exploded was the domestication of Saffron, Crocus sativa.


What this means is "selection for extra-long stamens".

By using these selected plants with the tools of today, harvest of a kilogram is around four hundred hours of labor.

There are several wild crocuses, such as in the writings of Sargon, it is wild species, which have been used for thousands of years. But they have hardly ever been cultivated.

The only way Crete could have functioned would have meant that once a year, for only about a week of peak harvest, there would be an extremely high demand for labor.


It worked, because modern saffron comes from a single event, all commercial plants are the same species with almost no genetic difference other than small regional phenotypes. The plant is sterile and must be cloned by the gorms. That is what will appear in the Song of Solomon and Jerusalem temple incense:

In ancient Persia, saffron (Crocus sativus var. haussknechtii now called Crocus haussknechtii by botanists) was cultivated at Derbena and Isfahan in the 10th century BC. There, Persian saffron threads have been found interwoven into ancient Persian royal carpets and funeral shrouds.

The Latin term crocus is certainly a Semitic loanword. It is adapted from the Aramaic form kurkema via the Arabic term kurkum and the Greek intermediate κρόκος krokos, which once again signifies "yellowish".

That's the same "Isfahan" we just discovered in the 1750s. I don't know what it is. They become the largest-producing region, which is why it was originally thought to have been Iranian in origin, which is refuted by genetic study:

The first signs of saffron cultivation were found in Aegean Bronze Age frescoes from Crete and Santorini, dating back to 1700 to 1500 before the common era (BCE).

The crocuses depicted on the frescoes in Xeste 3 show distinctive similarities with modern cultivated saffron (C. sativus) such as their long and intensively red stigmas overtopping the dark violet petals. These visual characteristics are also found on other artistic representations of crocus flowers on ceramics and cloth (Day, 2011b; Dewan, 2015; Marinatos, 2015). Typical for this time was the syllabic script Linear B (Shelmerdine, 1998). The ideogram (script character) representing saffron shows very long stigmas overtopping three pictured petals (Day, 2011a; Dewan, 2015) matching all afore-mentioned representations as well as today’s cultivated saffron.

Moreover, the previously mentioned Linear B tablets also include information on large amounts of traded saffron, with many dedicated fabric-processing tools found in Akrotiri (Day, 2011a).

In ancient Egypt, Theban tombs of five high officials whose career spanned the time from Queen Hatshepsut through the early reign of Amenophis III (New Kingdom; c. 1480–1380 BCE) depict men carrying textiles to be presented as a tribute. Style of ceilings and wall-paintings in these tombs is Aegean and reflects artistic motifs derived from saffron-colored textiles (Wachsmann and Wachsmann 1987; Barber 1991; Dewan 2015). The individuals appearing in these paintings are dressed in a stylized version of Aegean Bronze Age costumes that resemble those in the Procession Fresco from Knossos (Rehak 1996). The adjacent hieroglyphic inscriptions which appear above those men geographically identifies them as Aegean natives, the Keftiu, which is the Egyptian name for Crete, and describes them as people living in the “Islands in the midst of the sea”...

It's really simple. The domesticated sativa genetics match the frecoes. All modern saffron comes from Crete right before the eruption.


So you'd want to re-build the place. Kind-hearted good-neighborliness may not be the appropriate explanation here. If you were a rich, elite oligarchy in mainland Greece, and, you were looking at the fields of the most expensive thing, what would you do. Start dividing corms probably.


This already is a dispute on a human level. The pagan argument is that the Minoans were a Goddess-heavy culture, which the Myceneans suborned with the male gods of their system.


The Myceneans were so powerfully reactive to the volcano that they don't even mention it. However, their "system", as a cultural sphere, was not invulnerable to numerous minor misfortunes of many kinds.

Saffron is created by the Minoans, monopolized by the Myceneans, and found with Solomon and in Isfahan when they are gone.


Would Solomon have been "wise" enough to know about his own saffron and tin, and what the Queen of Sheba was really about?

Does one get the best story from the Kohen or Levites:

Ezekiel also distinguishes between altar-priests and lower Levites, but in Ezekiel the altar-priests are sons of Zadok instead of sons of Aaron; many scholars see this as a remnant of struggles between different priestly factions in First Temple times, finding resolution by the Second Temple into a hierarchy of Aaronite altar-priests and lower-level Levites, including singers, gatekeepers and the like.

In later books of the Hebrew Bible, Aaron and his kin are not mentioned very often except in literature dating to the Babylonian captivity and later. The books of Judges, Samuel and Kings mention priests and Levites, but do not mention the Aaronides in particular. The Book of Ezekiel, which devotes much attention to priestly matters, calls the priestly upper class the Zadokites after one of King David's priests. It does reflect a two-tier priesthood with the Levites in subordinate position. A two-tier hierarchy of Aaronides and Levites appears in Ezra, Nehemiah and Chronicles. As a result, many historians think that Aaronide families did not control the priesthood in pre-exilic Israel. What is clear is that high priests claiming Aaronide descent dominated the Second Temple period. Most scholars think the Torah reached its final form early in this period, which may account for Aaron's prominence in Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers.

Well you would get more value from Ezekiel or Kings, whereas the Exodus &c., material, is clearly to justify the Aaronites, particularly over the Amalekites.


As to the value of saffron, comparatively, these are pagan references on it:

The saffron dye & spice obtained from the three female style of each bloom had a value greater than jewels or precious metals, causing it to become the most widespread cultivar in the ancient world, from at least millenium before the rise of Athens.


During the Eleusian Mysteries, initiates by the thousands honored the godling Krokos as an ancestral divinity of some consequence, first to have dwelt among the brackish rivers & inlets of the Rhiti district near Athens. There was a guarded ceremony which was known as the krokosis, the importance of which was never revealed to outsiders, though practiced into the Christian era.


All crocuses were sacred to Demeter & Persephone, with the Saffron symbolic of the death of the world, the white-crocused mantle being snow upon Demeter's sad shoulders, & spring's Golden Crocus representing the joy of Demeter. Of these, however, only the deathly Saffron Crocus possessed the sacred spice.


The saffron spice became best identified with Eos or Aurora in classical antiquity, but the flower itself belonged formost to the Furies, & to Demeter & Persephone or Black Aphrodite.

In Greece & Rome she came to be identified as Eos or Aurora the Goddess of the Dawn, with herself, her throne, her sacred robes, even her wedding bed, all the color of gold & saffron.

Ovid among others called Eos the "Saffron mother," & many ancient poets allude to her rosy-red (saffron-dyed) fingers.

There is a mystical attachment to Saffron Eos who harmonizes Fire & Water, being as she is both Light & Dew, dwelling in a world that Night readied for Day. This harmony is at the base of many mystical systems of religion. The myths of of Eos falling in love with such mortals as Kephalos, Orion, Kleitos & Tithonos preserves an echo of this ancient idea that Eos is the source of mortal enlightenment. She was simultaneousy a Goddess of erotic love, & was said to spend her nights with a series of mortal lovers, her saffron being a mighty aphrodisiac.

That she was the kidnapper of such lovers as Tithonos & Kephalos, rather than their seducer, reveals an aggressiveness like unto that of Zeus who raped women in sundry guises without bothering to win them with his charms. When Zeus tricked Europa the mother of Minoa into coupling, he first took the form of a gentle bull & breathed saffron spice from his nostrils.

Eos herself was as a rule sexually out of control because of her saffron nature, without which she would neither have loved nor illuminated mortals.


Many of Nyx's daughters were associated with the morning sun, notably the Hesperides who dwelt far away on an island beneath which Eos had her bed, guarding the Golden Apples of the Sun.


In Phoenicia, the place of Carthage named for Kar, the edible saffron corm as well as some of the spice was pounded & cooked to make sacramental crescent-cakes for the goddess Ashtoreth (or Ashtaroth), whose name in Greek became Astarte, & in earlier Syria, Canaan, & Israel she was Anath, who is alluded to in the book of Jeremiah, a native of Anathoth ("Daughers of Anath").

...the Cretan role of the Corybantes or Curetes in protecting the infant Zeus, who was said to have been fashioned entirely of saffron, or to have the odor of saffron in his infancy.


Cretan Zeus was chosen to be a sacrificial grain-god (just as Athaliah intended to sacrifice Joash, whose Yahwist cult not coincidentally had its Temple founded by Solomon upon a Threshing-floor purchased by David). Zeus was hidden in a sacred Cave (Joash in the Temple) where he was nursed by the Goat-goddess Amalthea (akin to Joash's nurse who was hidden with Joash in the ruined Temple). Her biblical name was Kerenhappuch, "Horn of Kohl," Kohl being a common eye cosmetic. The horn was thought to be the same as "Amalthea's Horn," the horn of a she-goat, hence Amalthea is Karenhappuch's name in the Septuagint & the pseudonpegraphic Testament of Job.



Lucrecius likewise speaks of these Curetes as defenders of infant Jupiter against Saturn. He says they were both Cretan & Phrygian, & were the armed guard of "the Mighty Mother," vis, Cybele, tramping warlike over the mountains as She rode in her lion-drawn chariot. He said they went about "With flowers fallen like snow upon the Mother & her bands of companions," reminiscent of the white snow-crocuses that formed Demeter's mantel. These snowfall flowers may well have been both autumn & spring crocuses which were the source of the bee's honey that was brought to the cavern to feed infant Zeus. Virgil explicitely states that Saffron flowers were essential for the maintenance of these sacred bees. The bees were themselves armed warriors that loved flowers, even as were the Curetes.

The magic of the Crocus & its association with the birth & sustenance of infant Cretan Zeus survived in later myths of the adult Zeus & his bride Hera. When they made love upon a river bank, as told to us in the Iliad, a bed or saffron crocuses rose up around them in full bloom. The saffron spice that issued from these crocuses was a "golden dew" so bright that had anyone passed by the riverside nuptial bed of the God & Goddess, all that would have been seen was the shimmering light.

That plant summarizes everything about Solomon's world, leaving us room to suspect, why would anyone be interested in altering pre-Solomonic history by replacing it with Genesis, which is rather more directly attached to "a class of functionaries" replacing the Davidic priests.